kublakan, how many do you grow in pots? Do you use a drip system or do you water by hand? What ground cover do you use? I hate the constant weeding that must be done because of the seed constantly blowing in from the 100 acre field behind us.

Beautiful, Kublakan! I am always in awe of Kate's garden, I LOVE IT!

Wow, Kublakan. Those are amazing! I'm sure the day you actually decide to plant them will be a long, long, hot day, but they look great right now.

Thank you Sara & Corey. With well over 200 bushes I doubt my Rome will be built in one day, lol. Beth, I know I'm in the 200s, but I haven't done an inventory in a while, so.... I only hand water my select roses potted in Costco pots, that's about 17 bushes and it takes quite a while. All the other roses are watered with overhead sprinklers that go off in the mornings. By midday the leaves are dried up. I use the same ground cover you find in the nurseries.

http://www.agrisupply.com/ground-cover/p/57380/

Without the stuff I would have given up on my roses by now. My issue is just as nefarious as yours. I deal with crab grass that runs like alien tentacles all over the place.

Here's my cottage garden -- the center bed in the backyard. I mix perennials and shrubs and bulbs in with the roses. (Ignore my neighbor's ugly garage--I do, as best I can.)

Here is more of a close-up view of part of that bed. That big green shrub towards the back of the pic is a paniculata hydrangea not yet in bloom. The lower level white plant scattered throughout the garden is hardy garden geranium.

Here is part of the same bed about a month later as the hydrangea shrub is coming into bloom. It will bloom for the last half of summer.

Hope that gives you some ideas.

Kate

kublakan how close are your roses. I thought they had to be aprx. 4 ft apart here in Florida. Though I have always like the look of the roses growing much closer together. Are they just closer because they are in pots. Anyway you inspire me. I also love everyone else photo.... I especially like those that have mixed flower gardens. Unfortunately, I don't think we can have a lot of those annuals down here in Fl. Though mayve some of the other S. Fl gardeners can correct me if I am wrong. I love to learn new things.

Kublakan, wait until you get some of those fortuniana roses in the ground. They will take off and bloom like you've never seen.

I used to grow all my roses in pots too and one day I decided to try to make a little rose hedge in my side yard. The roses took off and bloomed like none I had ever grown in a pot. I was so pleased with the result that I started clearing out space to put them all in the ground. Now all my fortuniana roses are in a new side yard garden I made last spring. But all my doc Huey ones are still in pots. Those just dont do well in the ground here. Except for my Don Juans, those two have done great and they are both on Doc.

Here are some pics of my garden:

To the left you can see Dick Clark in bloom and to the right you can see little Margot Koster in bloom.
These pics were from last spring and you can see the Twinny snap dragons and lobelia in full bloom. Now they only have occasional blooms.
To the top left is Dick Clark. I usually cut my rose blooms for the vase so there are not too many in the actual garden. I fill it out with Petunias, Lobelia and Snapdragon (all grown from seed) and a few marigolds and cosmos also from seed.
Here you can see Double Delight and Ingrid Burgman which bloomed while I was away on a trip. The little pink flowers are from an impatiens I grew from seed (you cant get them anymore around here due to the downy mildew that wiped them out, but some of mine still grew well from seed).

Here is a view from the other side. Here you can see tall tall Evelyn (center of pic) near the fence and Papi Delbard being trained on the fence horizontally behind the bench. Both have had sparse blooms but are fairly recently planted so I'm giving them time. On the arbor I grow Zephirine D (new, no blooms yet) on one side and Eden (also never bloomed) on the other. I have a few tree roses on either side of the bend and some mini roses growing in hanging baskets and in those little terracotta pots. They don't bloom much, but they survive. (Margot Koster below near the arbor, always has a few pink pecks on it. So cute!

Here is a couple of shots of my front yard rose garden (front side yard)

That's Easy Does It growing on fortuniana. This one was planted 2 years ago so its much happier and established than the ones in my back yard which were planted just this spring. :)

Below is Quietness. One of the few roses that does very well on its own roots here.

On the arbor I grow Pink Enchantment and Don Juan. Both bloom well. I have a newly planted Kathleen Haarop there too that has grown well but not yet bloomed. To the back right there you can see an nicely rounded Duchess De Brabant that has no blooms on it as of the photo time, but usually has lots of small pink blooms on it. Right now she's struggling a little with the heat, but she'll be happy again come fall.

Sharon, one of my reasons for having the roses in pots (7gal) was to see how they do in a specific spot. I've had to adjust to my recent success given that historically I haven't been so lucky with my roses surviving to adulthood. Eventually I'll space them out more, although 4 feet is probably more than I'll give them. I'll probably give them three feet maximum. I'm currently redesigning the layout of the garden and plan to open up more space so I can do a hedge of floribundas in back of a row of hybrid teas along a fence.

Thank you for the kind words. If you want to see what inspires me, check out this YouTube video: https://youtu.be/bLq8gQbLJA8

I'm also interested to see what other SoFl rose growers do.

OMG Kubla, You ENABLER!!! I loved that video. For a minute I thought it was from someone here in South Florida and I got so excited. But then I saw it was in California. But WOW. If I lived near those people I think I'd picnic on their sidewalk every weekend. They'd have to shoo me off with a broom or something LOL.

LMAO, Denise!

So amazing, thank you for all these pictures!

kublakan and SoFL Rose z10, how often do you water? What do you do to fertilize? I think our weather is pretty similar (Hawaii and Florida) so would be interested in knowing what you do to promote so many blooms.

dublinbay z6 (KS) I love the natural flow of your garden!

I water about once a week, sometimes 2x a week when its very dry out. Here it rains somewhat regularly when the hot weather arrives, so you can acutally get away with less watering. (I water my planters more frequently about 3x a week). I have a sprinkler system to which I have attached a soaker hose system which runs both the sprinklers in my perinial garden and the soaker hose which goes to the rose garden.

I use a granular fertilizer around all my rose bushes about 4x a year but I also use liquid fertilizer 2x a month. For the liquid I use the new miracle grow system that attaches to the hose and releases the liquid fertilizer via the soaker hose directly to the rose garden. However, I cut a hole in the bottle and re-fill it with a cheaper generic fertilizer called grow gain which costs me about $10 for a gallon of concentrate.

For my potted plants I use a no mix hose-end adapter made by Ortho and the same liquid concentrate (grow gain) and set the dial to the correct ratio. I try to do it as often as possible (once per week) but I usually don't get around to doing it that often. Usually like once every 3 weeks is my average. I just count on the granular fertilizer to do its thing in between liquid feedings. And honestly, I think I could still get away with fertilizing a bit more. Our sandy soil doesn't hold nutrient as much as other soils, so we have to fertilize more often.

I'm thinking of adding manure to the rose beds twice a year to bring more earth worms and try and make it more sustainable. But that will be expensive and time consuming for me as the only thing I have access to would be Black Cow at home depot, which is kind of pricey. And I'd have to lug all those heavy bags of manure around.

SoFL, you have to show me how you got the soaker hoses to work for you. I attempted a soaker system with my sprinkler system and the pressure busted the hoses.

I was watering daily with one day off a week (remember, I have my entire garden in pots, so they dry out quickly), but now I'll have to cut back since Broward County just implemented new watering regulations. I might have to start planting some of my roses in the ground earlier than my Fall goal date.

I take a trip down to Homestead Florida about six times a year and buy granular fertilizer from a place called Diamond Fertilizer (it used to be called Atlantic Fertilizer) in large bags. I also buy a water soluble fertilizer. I mix it in an old Miracle Gro dispenser with fish emulsion about once a month.

You know, I don't seem to have any trouble with the hoses busting, but I do have problems with them getting somewhat clogged to where they don't drip enough. Ive taken to poking small holes near each rose busy with a thumb tack. So far they've held up, but I know they wont last long. Afterwards I plan on changing it to a drip irrigation system.

Thank you for the info... currently just using hose and buckets right now, and am not able to do drip irrigation, all my roses are in pots. It's been really hot here and there are some sprinklings but not downpour rain. Even with that, I try to water only twice/three times a week deeply. I wonder about those end of hose sprayer things, since I do have soluble and liquid fertilizers that I like to use and I am tired of my hand-pump gallon sprayers clogging up on me. I use a large safety pin on the holes.

Kublakan thank you for the video link. I loved it. Your roses are close like this and I think they are just as beaufiful. Do you think I could get the same look here in Florida but with them in the ground? So Fl Rose, I have to stand corrected, I see you have some annuals in there and I love that look. Surely, those aren't making it the summer sun here are they. If not when do you plant your seeds and how long do they last. I love your trellis and your rose garden looks terrific. Both of you are inspiring me.

I think that you'd have an easier time with the roses looking like this if they were IN the ground. Just be sure to only plant roses on Fortuniana root stock, otherwise you're asking for trouble. If you follow the video, you'll note that a lot of her roses are on Fortuniana. Luckly, she blogs for her local rose society so you can keep up with what's new in her garden and learn a bit while you're at it. Thank you for the compliment. I have roserexia. None of my roses ever look all that spectacular to me. I can rarely look past all the problems/imperfections. I wonder if I'm the only one sometimes, lol.

Wow! Everyones gardens are simply beautiful. Love them all!!

Kublakan I did the same as you. Move the potted roses around until I found out where they liked it best while I was working on getting rid of the weeds. One thing that worked well for me was to get big piles of mulch to smother weeds and keep the pots shaded and roots cool. Sun hitting the sides of pots can kill 1/4 to 1/3 of the roots. Turn the pots and you can kill another third by accident. Mark all the sunny sides of the pots or try to shade them in some way. While the mulch is killing the weeds, the worms are turning the bottom of it into plant food for you and bringing it into the soil.

there is a fence to the left of the gate. This is Lillian Gibson, to the right is a small climber. There are hostas, coreopsis, sedums, and daiseys planted also but some things were not blooming when i took the picture.

This climber is to the left, leading to the gate.
the arch over the gate. The rose is Veilchenblau, to the right are small perennials.
a different view from the gate

How beautiful, Altorama! I was going to ask if no 3 was Veilchenblau, before you tagged the photos. Is no.2 Tausendschoen?

Yes it is, I forgot to say that!

Thanks, Altorama, wish I had the room, it is gorgeous.

Melodye.

This is Edmond Proust who grows opposite Veilchenblau. The darker rose behind is Geschwind's Orden.

Veilchenblau on the left, Edmond Proust and Geschwind's Orden to the right.

In the front yard. Salvia, sage,hostas and other perennials. Behind are roses.

Melodye, thank you! It really isn't that big, I just stuff a lot into it!

There is a lot to be said for stuffing! I use a lot of the same perennials but not Hostas as they are real snail magnets here.

I hate snails!!

Yeah, and I can't put snail bait down because of the St Bernard and the snail eating birds!

I can't use beer baits either because the Saint likes beer!

What about

Diatomaceous Earth?

I have a few bags of old swimming pool filter sand left from the last service, but I don't think it is suitable even though it contains a form of DE; I don't want to dehydrate everything else. :-) I've used coffee grounds with some success but, unlike Aqua Eyes, I don't have a bulk source. My DH & I love our coffee, but I don't think we could stand too much caffeine buzz at our age :-D

Melodye

Some of the Starbucks around here will give you free used coffee grounds for the asking. they are just going to throw them away. do you have any coffee shops like that near you?

There is a dog safe snail repellant that I used once in my garden and I've had very little snail problems ever since. Its been nearly 4 years and I never even used a lot of it. Maybe its just a coincidence, but it worked wonders for me. The product is by Earth-Tone and looks like this

https://www.horseloverz.com/product/other/410317-slug-snail-control.html?sku=5-307586&gdftrk=gdfV27555_a_7c1161_a_7c2883_a_7c5_d_307586&ev_pid=5-307586&ev_ppid=51320962143&ev_adtype=pla&ev_cmpg=Shopping&gclid=Cj0KEQjw8-GtBRCMl7m54PzgjNQBEiQAIZckv-dniRq9AzB3fEv9eGiLhHD_HF97nJsFPkRwhQgw2gwaAqQC8P8HAQ

Thanks for the advice, Countrygirl & SoFL. No, there are no handy coffee shops, unfortunately. I don't think we have Earth-Tone in Australia but will look to see if there is something similar. I don't want anything that will hurt the birds either. Sorry, I have lured us off the original topic:-(

Snapped this shot today...

Wow you have lots of roses blooming!

not too many roses blooming right now...

I was surprised by this enclave in my backyard and just had to post it.

That looks great!

Adrian, those look amazing. What varieties are they? The roses love the summer rains here (as long as you spray, LOL). I have been cutting mine and bringing them inside so they don't fry in the midday heat.

SoFL, what a bounty! Lots of pastels is beautiful. Unfortunately, I did not do much planning with my purchases so they're all over the place as far as color, with several plants the same color, etc... anyways, lovely and inspiring, thank you!

msdorkgirl I do the same thing...

Denise,

What you see there is ONE established McCartney rose (pink) and several Pope John Paul's in pots. I've been heeding Geof's advice and trying NOT to dead head or prune in order to slow/prevent thrips damage but these roses continue to grow despite my attempts, lol.

Okay, your turn. What is in the vases? I love the orange ones.

BTW, I took a trip to Nelson's this past weekend since I was in town for a wedding. Picked up ten roses. I'm about all out of space, lol. It's getting close to the time I'll be planting all these roses in the ground. Waiting for a slow down in weed growth.

Great pics on the other thread of a similar title ;-)

Fantastic photos everyone! :-)

The orande one in the center is Sundowner (one of my Aldi roses bareroot potted up in February. The lighter Orange is Easy Does It.

PJPII is an amazing rose. I love mine. I don't have the McCartney rose. I might have to get that one next time I'm up at Cool Roses. I wonder when they will have another open house.